


the highway signs say we're close but I don't read those things anymore

by fortymaliks



Category: One Direction (Band), Radio 1 RPF
Genre: and let's add in some Matty Healy because why the hell not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-15
Updated: 2014-06-15
Packaged: 2018-02-04 19:42:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1790902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortymaliks/pseuds/fortymaliks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>The thing about distancing yourself from someone, Nick thinks, is that sometimes that someone is in a world renown boyband that you have to work with because your job depends on it.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>A bit of angst set during Radio 1's Big Weekend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the highway signs say we're close but I don't read those things anymore

**Author's Note:**

> All the mistakes you may find in here belong to me. Mine all mine. Thanks to mrsyt31 for reading this over for me!

The thing about distancing yourself from someone, Nick thinks, is that sometimes that someone is in a world renown boyband that you have to work with because your job depends on it.

Nick’s always looked forward to Big Weekend before, but the thought of having to see Harry in the flesh, looking amazing and assured and like someone who _doesn’t belong to Nick anymore_ keeps making his stomach turn.

Now, on the day, faced with the chaos that is One Direction, Nick’s hoping that his plan of sucking it up and mowing through it will work out.

“Hiya,” Nick chirps as the boys spill into the dressing room, right before he’s engulfed by an overzealous Niall. The hug is a tight one; tight enough that Nick can pretend it’s what took his breath away.

Anything he can grab onto to pretend that it isn’t Harry who’s making his chest tight. Harry, who is standing awkwardly to one side, boot scuffing the ground in front of him as he attempts to look anywhere but at Nick. Harry, who seems to not have cut his hair in ages. Harry, who Nick is supposed to be taking a break from.

Niall bounces away, and Liam takes his place, ending his hug with a friendly slug to Nick’s shoulder. Zayn nods his greeting, mutters, “alright, Grim?”, Louis graces him with a polite hello, and then there’s only Harry, and everyone is watching them to see how they’ll play it.

Harry goes in for a hug at the same time as Nick offers his hand, and Nick sees Harry wince right before he takes it. Harry’s palm is sweaty and he looks embarrassed, but he shakes it off quickly enough.

Nick can’t help the reassuring way he squeezes Harry’s hand, can’t help the small smile that comes to his lips, but Harry’s not looking. He’s looking at anything else that’s not Nick.

The thing about taking breaks from people you love, Nick knows now, is that memories are really fucking stubborn.

And yeah, Nick remembers.

Nick remembers how he’d slide his hands across the small of Harry’s back to palm over his hips as he slammed inside, again and again. He remembers gripping him tightly, tugging Harry back onto his cock, watching the gorgeous line of Harry’s broad, tan shoulders as he braced himself up, fists clenching in the sheets.

Blinking, Nick let’s go of Harry’s hand and steps back.

“Right, well,” Nick stammers, grabbing Fiona’s wrist, “best get going. I’ll see you lot on stage, yeah?”

He only catches a second of the way Harry’s brows furrow into a frown before he’s yanking Fiona as far away from One Direction as his job will let him be.

***

Another problem that Nick has recently discovered is that it’s much harder to remember not to be jealous when you’re pissed drunk.

They’re in a club in Glasgow. Fiona and Ian had insisted, even having managed to convince Finchy to join them. Nick couldn’t really pass it up.

He’d known Harry would be here, but since they’d managed to get the awkward encounter out of the way early on, Nick had figured they could just ignore each other and leave it.

What Nick hadn’t counted on was Matty Healy, with his serpentine smile and his wandering hands. Nick might not have passed up watching Matty basically demonstrate his fellatio skills on a bottle of cheap red wine in the past, but he doesn’t fancy having to watch it happen while he’s wrapped around Harry Styles on the dancefloor.

Several shots of tequila do nothing to help Nick forget (or rather, to help Nick _remember_ why he’s not supposed to be caring). It’s not until “several” turns into “too much” that Nick stumbles his way through the crowd himself and pulls Harry away from Matty.

“Hello to you, too,” Harry shouts above the music. He’s frowning, but he lets himself be led.

Nick shoves through throngs of people to the corridor that leads to the loos. He tries to focus on finding a quiet space, his mind struggling to create a plan past his “remove Harry from Matty Healy” goal, but all he can concentrate on is the warm weight of Harry’s hand in his.

He tugs Harry further down the hall until he finds a door that doesn’t lead to the toilets. Either Nick pushes too hard or the door swings too easily, but he falls through, pulling Harry after, and the door clangs shut behind them.

“Nick,” Harry says, quietly, when it’s only them. It seems harsh with the noises of the club muffled.

“Harry Styles,” Nick says. It’s much louder; so loud that Nick immediately flinches. They’re close, though, closer than they’ve been in a long time, so Nick buries his face in Harry’s neck, in the familiar smell of sweat and Harry’s shampoo. His nose brushes the skin, and why wasn’t he supposed to have this anymore? He can’t for the life of him remember.

Harry seems to, though, and he presses Nick gently away.

“This was your idea,” Harry reminds him, frowning. Nick wants to rub his thumb over the creases between his eyes, smooth them out so that Harry never worries about anything ever again.

He settles, instead, for pushing gently back into Harry’s space. He walks him backwards, step by step, slowly enough so that Harry could stop him if he wanted to. Harry’s back hits the wall and he sighs, letting out a breath like he’s been holding it for a long time, before he reaches up to fist his fingers in Nick’s tee and pull him closer.

“You should probably apologize to Matty,” Harry tells him softly, lips ghosting his ear as he pulls their hips flush together. He grinds lazily into Nick as if he’s given up resisting.

Harry removes any guess work from the equation when he reaches down and thumbs open the button on his jeans, splitting them and shoving them down just enough so that they bracket his thighs. He looks back up at Nick and cocks an eyebrow, and Nick laughs helplessly.

He’s too drunk to comment on how quick Harry is to get naked, and it’s been too long. He trails a hand down Harry’s torso almost without thinking. Nick pointedly ignores Harry’s grin as he maps the familiar dips and curves, his hand finding it’s way lower over muscles more defined since Nick had last been there.

“He should apologize to _me_ ,” Nick insists, not really paying any attention now that he’s got his hands on Harry’s skin. His fingers wrap over Harry’s cock; the length of him firm and soft and familiar in Nick’s grip.

“He, _god_ , Nick,” Harry’s voice breaks as Nick starts stroking, moving his fist slow and sure. “He’s probably- _ah_ \- having a breakdown about it.”

“If he touches you again, I’ll break all his fingers,” Nick vows into the pulse point just underneath Harry’s ear.

Nick can hear the low thrum of the music. He thinks he can feel it vibrating through the wall of the club, through Harry, but it could just be Nick’s own pulse. He’s not sure if the warmth in his veins is from the extreme fondness that comes along with being close to Harry, or if it’s the alcohol in his blood. It’s probably a combination of both, Nick decides, pulling back slightly to watch Harry’s face as he brings his free arm up to press against Harry’s chest, pinning him slowly in place as he strokes him like he likes it.

“He’d never have me,” Harry pants, eyes dancing, “likes pussy too much.”

“Idiot,” Nick scoffs, “he’s an idiot.”

“Just like someone else I know,” Harry tells him, just as his head falls back against the wall. He’s pushing into Nick’s fist now, hips working desperately. Nick’s always loved Harry a little desperate; when he’s panting and begging, and looking at Nick like he hung the moon.

It’s that look now that prompts Nick to lean in, touch their foreheads together. Harry only has to move a miniscule amount to brush his mouth over Nick’s, and that’s what does it, that’s what has Nick shoving him further against the wall and tightening his grip on Harry’s cock.

“I’ve changed my mind,” he swears, because he can’t bring himself to say the three words that he really means. He means them anyway, though, in this moment and probably always, since long before the day he lied to Harry and told him it would probably be easier if they went back to being just friends.

He feels Harry freeze beneath him. The hands that had been twisted in Nick’s shirt press gently instead, and then more firmly, until Harry dislodges Nick from him, knocking both of his hands away.

Nick watches in confusion as Harry struggled to catch his breath. He watches the flush of Harry’s cheeks, as he pushes himself up from the wall and struggles to tuck himself back into the obscene cling of his jeans.

“Harry, wait, Harry,” Nick steps back to him, but Harry stops him with a single hand, palm out.

He hasn’t fully struggled his breathing back to normal yet when he finally casts his eye in Nick’s direction. His voice isn’t perfectly steady yet, but he still says, “I can’t always just be sitting around waiting for you to change your mind.”

Nick suddenly feels a lot more sober than he is as it all comes crashing back to him, all the reasons why he’d needed to not have Harry like this anymore. He can’t quite keep the old sting from his tone, as his fists clench. “And I can’t always just be sitting around waiting, period.”

“Oh god, no,” Harry shakes his head and recoils so vehemently, Nick instantly feels guilty.

“Harry, we…”

“No, Nick, no. I’m not doing this anymore, we’re, we’re,” he fumbles for the door while he talks, as if he needs nothing more than to put distance between him and Nick. “We’ve done this already, we’re done with this.”

“Harry,” Nick says weakly. He leaves it there; lets it hang because he doesn’t know how to finish it. They have done this, they’ve been over it so many times. Nothing is different now, aside from the aching hollow in the middle of Nick’s chest and an unused contact that sits in his phone.

Harry finds the door, yanks it open, and this is it, Nick thinks, panic welling up, he’s going to leave Nick here in the dark.

He stops, though, turning back towards Nick so that Nick can see his hands picking idly at the front of his jeans.

“It’s not the right time for us, Nick, you’re probably right about that,” Harry says, firmly. Nick opens his mouth to agree, but Harry raises a hand in protest. 

“You’re right about that,” Harry repeats, “but you’re wrong about pretty much everything else. You’re wrong about how we’re no good for each other, and about how it’d never work out. Because maybe it wasn’t working out now, but Nick. Someday.”

“Someday, it’s gonna be you and me. We’re going to have a house with a fence around the back garden where our children can play and our dogs can run. We’re going to have a minivan and a huge guest room for when my mum comes to stay with us. Your Dad is going to come over to watch the rugby with us and we’re going to vacation with Aimee and Ian in Belize whenever we feel like it. And it’s going to be amazing, so amazing that it’s going to be worth all this shit,” Harry stutters to a halt with one hand on the knob of the door and one raking through his damp curls.

Nick stares at him.

He can picture it all, is the thing. And he wants it more than he’s ever wanted anything.

Harry’s gone before Nick can manage to finish swallowing around what is probably his heart stuck in his throat.

**Author's Note:**

> //[tumblr](http://fortymaliks.tumblr.com)//[twitter](http://twitter.com/fortymaliks)//


End file.
